


The Price of Victory

by indiefic



Category: Terminator - All Media Types, Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-07-27
Updated: 2015-07-27
Packaged: 2018-04-11 14:26:42
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,819
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4438940
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/indiefic/pseuds/indiefic
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Derek Reese thought he was willing to stop Judgment Day at any cost.</p><p>He didn't expect this to be the price.</p><p>Set sometime vaguely during the second season of T:SCC.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Price of Victory

Derek starts to roll over and quickly thinks better of it. He holds perfectly still, taking shallow breaths. He slowly opens his left eye and stares at the light blue pile of the bathmat. It’s morning, late morning from the way the light is slanting across the part of the kitchen floor that he can see in the distance from his position. There aren’t any windows in the bathroom and the light isn’t on, but the door is open and there’s a clock on the wall. If he wanted to sit up, he could simply look at the time.

But he won’t do that. He’s sure that if he absolutely had to, he could force himself into a sitting position. But the circumstances under which that would be possible are few. Very, very few. If his own life depended on it, he’s pretty damn sure he’d rather die.

“Do you require assistance?”

“Fuck off.” At least that’s what he tries to say. Through the (at least) two (probably three) cracked teeth, split lip and swollen jaw, he isn’t sure what it sounds like to the machine. He doesn’t care. It knows enough to know that it should leave him the hell alone. That’s why he’s in here in the first place. He would have just stayed where he was when he came to, but he dragged himself into the bathroom because it’s the one room that isn’t on the machine’s regular nightly patrol circuit.

He hears the heavy footfalls and a pair of worn motorcycle boots come into view. Again, Derek doesn’t move. He just lays there staring through the eye he can open out into the kitchen.

Charley crouches down and studies Derek for quite a while before he finally hooks an arm through Derek’s and pulls him into a sitting position, leaning back against the tub.

Derek makes a noise that doesn’t sound human, even to his own ears. He has no idea if he has a damn thing to do with the excruciating physical pain or not. He suspects not. He’s been in worse shape than this and never made a sound. He doesn’t look at Charley because he doesn’t want to know if Charley suspects as much.

Charley sits there, probably making sure Derek won’t topple over again. He disappears and comes back a few minutes later with a large bowl, towel and a glass of water. Derek’s pretty sure the bowl it from the living room and that it had been full of potpourri. Charley helps Derek take a drink of the water, then holds the bowl as Derek spits blood, tissue and chunks of tooth into the bowl.

Charley grimaces, but doesn’t say anything. Reaching into his pocket, he takes out a bottle of pills and shakes them. “Can you swallow these? I can give you a shot, but that’ll put you out again. This stuff will just take the edge off enough for you to move.”

“Pills.”

Charley sets the bowl down and pops the cap on the pill bottle. He shakes a few into his palm and then holds them out to Derek. Derek lifts his hand to take them. Rather than dropping the medication into Derek’s waiting hand, Charley takes Derek’s hand and studies it, turning it over before releasing it. He drops the pills into Derek’s palm and helps him take another drink of water.

Derek sits there, hoping to god the pills work fast. He watches as Charley dumps the bowl into the toilet and flushes it. He turns around and looks at Derek. “There’s no defensive marks on your hand or arm at all.”

Derek doesn’t reply.

“Did you want her to beat you to death?”

Derek looks up at Charley and then back toward the kitchen.

* * *

 

Half an hour later, Derek has managed to move himself to the couch. He sits there, watching Charley pace. Charley stops in front of the kitchen door and quickly looks away. “We can’t …” He trails off, clears his throat and starts again. “We can’t leave him there. We have to do something.”

“We’ll bury him next to Kyle.”

Charley turns around and looks at Derek, shocked.

“She didn’t tell me. I figured it out.”

Charley smiles wryly at that. At least Sarah was true to form. Trust no one. Not even her son’s uncle.

“Do you know where Kyle’s buried?”

Derek shakes his head. “No.”

Charley sighs and rubs the back of his neck. “Sarah won’t wake up for hours and we can’t wait that long.”

“We’ll wait as long as it takes.”

Charley gapes at him and Derek knows it’s on the tip of his tongue to ask him if he understands what that means, if he understand how much a human body can decompose in a matter of hours. But then luckily Charley seems to remember who he’s talking to and he figures, yeah, Derek Reese probably does know exactly how much a human body can decompose in a matter of hours.

* * *

 

Derek doesn’t help. Nothing and no one can help. But he doesn’t even try to render assistance. He can hear the play by play, clearly imagine it in his head. The machine physically subdues Sarah while Charley tries to talk to her. In this case, the machine will intervene regardless of orders. Because if the machine doesn’t intervene, Sarah Connor most certainly will do herself harm. As long as Sarah was beating on Derek with everything she had, no subroutines engaged. But once Sarah made the decision that she wasn’t actually going to beat Derek to death, she was out of targets. And the minute she turned on herself, the machine stepped in. At least it had the sense (do machines have sense? Programming. Whatever.) to call Charley. He sedated Sarah, forced her into a drugged sleep. It was preferable to the machine holding Sarah down while she screamed those inhuman screams.

But now Sarah’s awake and she really doesn’t want to have a conversation about where to bury her son. Derek doesn’t blame her one damn bit. But he does understand his role in this.

He pushes himself off the couch, ignoring the way his ribs crack as he moves. He steps into the master bedroom. It’s a mess. Sarah’s a mess. The machine prevented her from killing herself, but Sarah got a decent head start on the self-harming. There are claw marks on her arms, neck face, all self-inflicted. Her voice as she rages is broken, hoarse, like nails across chalk board. There are deep bruises everywhere, probably from the machine holding her down.

Derek sits down on the edge of the bed, watching Sarah. She stops, all at once. Stops screaming, stops struggling.

“Tell me where Kyle’s buried, so we can lay John to rest with family.”

Sarah blinks at him and then does the one thing she hasn’t done. She cries. There are no sobs, no noise at all. Just giant tears that roll down her bruised and bloody face until they disappear into her hair.

Sarah chokes out an address and Derek nods.

* * *

 

The fight has gone out of Sarah Connor.

As much as he hated the way she was revered by the troops in the trenches, and as much as he personally thinks she’s an uppity bitch and a pain in the ass to live with, he’s shocked at how profoundly the sight of her sitting there, kneeling next to the freshly turned earth of her son’s grave destroys him.

It might be worse than burying John.

* * *

 

“John Connor himself may have been the link to the propagation of Skynet.”

Derek turns and glares at the machine. He quickly glances over at Sarah, who is standing mutely on the patio, staring out at the skyline.

“John destroyed both the Turk and the T-1001, Weaver. Cromartie has been destroyed. Skynet’s infrastructure has been decimated. There are no indications that Judgment Day will happen.”

Derek can’t help himself. He snaps. “And you think that’s because John is dead?” he demands.

The machine turns its head to the side for a moment and then straightens it again. “It is possible. The survival of John Connor could have been linked to the survival of Skynet. Every move one side made to try and thwart the other could have unintentionally lead to their survival.”

“Shut the fuck up.”

Derek turns back to Sarah, but she’s still standing in the same place. Her back to them, clothes hanging off her thin frame, hair pulled back in a messy ponytail.

It’s several long moments before he notices the pool of dark liquid at her feet.

“Shit!” He’s running for her before his mind has finished processing the thought.

* * *

 

Jesse is standing there, watching him and Derek has absolutely nothing to say. He doesn’t even tell her the news – that it looks like they finally stopped Judgment Day. It will be a long while before he realizes that’s because he doesn’t care.

“So this is it,” she says carefully, absently brushing a lock of hair out of her eyes. “You’re leaving me for her.”

Derek shrugs. He isn’t going to tell Jesse that he sleeps with his arms wrapped around Sarah every night because he knows if he leaves her alone for more than a minute, she’ll find a way to off herself. He also refrains from telling Jesse that he isn’t sure why he should give a fuck if Sarah Connor offs herself.

Maybe he needs someone more pathetic than himself to worry about.

Or maybe he just needs company in hell.

Sarah Connor was never pathetic. Not in the years she protected John. Not when she mourned his death. And not even now when the only thing that keeps her going is the need to find a way out.

“Take care, Jesse.”

* * *

 

“Acute myelogenous leukemia. AML.”

Derek stares mutely at the doctor. He looks down at his hand, fingers interlaced with Sarah’s. The thick scar that runs along her wrist and inner arm is clearly visible. The doctors were able to patch her up that time. But now …

He looks up at the doctor. “The prognosis?”

The doctor purses his lips together. “Remission rates in healthy adults are encouraging with aggressive treatment,” he says. It’s a feint. Obviously Sarah is unwell. “But relapse rates are high.”

Derek looks over at Sarah. Her head is bowed, her eyes on the floor. But there’s the slightest smile on her lips.

Half an hour later, they leave the office with prescriptions and appointments and an impending sense of dread. At least that’s what Derek feels. He’s pretty sure he doesn’t want to know what Sarah feels.

She stops and turns to look at him. “Bury me with them,” she says simply before continuing on her way back to the truck.

She isn’t looking, but he nods. He’ll bury her with John and Kyle.

Who the hell will bury him?


End file.
